belated turkey bird wishes

well, i know i am a couple days late, but i just want to wish everyone a belated happy thanksgiving! this is also a nice opportunity to say how thankful i am to have such an amazing family and such amazing friends. life has been quite a roller coaster for me at times and there is no way i could have made it to where i am right now without ALL of you. it is always interesting to get philosophical and examine the importance of every person in your life. because really when you stop to think about it, you can learn and gain something from EVERY person you encounter. some people (like most of you who read this) have a more profound impact on your life, but even a cashier at the grocery store can impact you if you let her. is she in a great mood in spite of the crabby bastards coming through her line? then remember that if she can keep a smile on her face in that situation, so can you. is she the crabby bastard this time? then remember how much that bothers YOU and don't be that person.

the point i'm trying to make is, thank you for being a part of my life. i mean it from the bottom of my heart.

more about our thanksgiving activities when we're back home and settled in... right now we have to get ready to head to atlantic city and win some money!

a dichotomous weather weekend

so this weekend was interesting. saturday was downright summery, and yesterday was rainy and cold and rather wintery. it was pretty crazy. but an enjoyable weekend if you know how to properly take advantage of those kinds of days...

see, saturday we woke up to sunshine and warmth. and what does one do when it's sunny and warm outside and the leaves are still pretty? you take a motorcycle ride! it was the perfect day for it. i am, however, jaded from past late fall attempts at warm motorcycle rides, so i bundled up as though it were 60 degrees outside instead of 80. this was fine while we were in motion, but sucked when we stopped. but last year (or was it the year before?) we found ourselves stuck on interstate 81 in the dark and cold for several hours and i about froze my tush off. i was not having a repeat of that situation. our ride was actually pretty short, we stayed in the general richmond metro area, but we ended it with a stop at mary angela's pizza in carytown.

now, for those of you who don't know, we lost our favorite pizza joint near our house a few months ago and have not found a way to replace the holes left in our hearts from this. no pizza in suburban chesterfield really compares (RIP carmela, we miss you). mary angela's is the best pizza in richmond that i am aware of. so eating it was... lovely. really, lovely. (when's the last time you heard someone describe eating pizza as lovely? never? well that's how freaking fabulous this pizza is.) at the same time, it was sad... because we just don't get pizza that good very often and are too lazy to drive to downtown richmond to get it often. after having it, though, maybe we need to change that. if i drove to work i might stop there on my way home occasionally and pick up a pie, but that's not really possible since i take the bus... *sigh* why did carmela have to close...

yesterday, as i mentioned, proved the perfect dichotomy to saturday's indian summer weather. we woke up to rain beating down on our house and wind whipping us around a la wizard of oz. well, okay, it wasn't as bad as the wizard of oz. but i love that movie and i like exaggerating every once in a while. :) we woke up and... did nothing. ha! well, that's not true. bryan, my dear dear husband, plopped himself in front of the computer and worked on our wedding photo slide show for, let me add it up... 15 hours. give or take 30 minutes here and there. this man is dedicated to making this the absolute best wedding slide show ever, and i think he's definitely succeding. perhaps he is a bit of a perfectionist, but i guarantee you're gonna love it (and not just because you will finally be able to see lots of our wedding photos!).

i managed to get out of the house and went and changed cell phone providers to verizon so that i can talk for free with most people i know. also i got a camera phone and free pics and text messaging so that i can go shopping, snap a photo of what i want to buy that might need bryan's approval, and shoot it over to him via cell phone. this might sound a bit obnoxious to you, but 1) i can never get the man to go shopping and 2) when he does go he doesn't let me buy anything. so the pix messaging will, i hope, allow me to buy stuff that requires both of our approval in a more timely manner. :)

after a little shopping at target i headed home where i set to trying to knock out the rest of my wedding thank you notes. i have been slacking on this but WILL finish them tonight. i swear. so if you haven't gotten yours yet, you will soon. also, i made chicken and dumplings in my new calphalon cookware. oh, i also seared some olive oil onto the bottom of my big ol' skillet and now it's brown. that sucks and i gotta figure out how to get it off. hey, i never said i was an expert at this cooking stuff, particularly not in these fancy shmancy pots and pans. although i do love them already...

tonight: watch last week's episode of lost, do laundry, finish thank you notes.

da link went.

well, lots has been happening and you people have gotten no updates to this blog. at least i gave you wedding pictures, right? :) i can't wait to show everyone all of them and see everyone else's! bryan has found some software that makes creating a cool slideshow out of the pictures easy. well, kinda. :) he's been working on the slideshow very diligently so that we can take it on tour of our families and such... so one day when he finishes you'll all get to see the pictures.

we have been keeping pretty busy. a couple weekends ago we went to a halloween party at our friends' traci and steven's house. we had a great time, but in true bryan and lydia fashion, we didn't think much about costumes until the day of the party. i looked around the bedroom to see what i could find that might serve as the base of a costume, and came across bryan's dirt bike gear. a couple years ago when he bought his dirtbike, he bought all the clothes/shoes/etc. that he needed to ride it safely. so we decided that bryan would be a motocross racer and i would be his teenage motocross racer groupie girlfriend. i had a couple things i thought i needed for the outfit, but needed to buy a wig and some "accessories." see pictures below:



no, i did not get a boob job with our wedding gift money. they were socks. but it was fun to have them for one night. :) as someone who was not blessed with these particular assets, it was very interesting to see the way the males of our species react to them.... a fascinating social experiement. :)

as if the fake boobs and all weren't enough goofiness for halloween, bryan and i decided to dress up again on halloween night. this time, we were playing a prank on our friends tammy and justin who live a couple of miles down the road from us. they deck their house all out for halloween and bryan thought it would be fun to go harass him. well, it was fun. but i felt like i was going to get found out and arrested for impersonating someone who is still of age to be trick or treating:

yes, i am wearing a fitted sheet. and yes, we trick or treated one house which was not our friends' house. i was terrified we were going to get caught. it was hillarious.

so now you have the halloween updates. hopefully the next time i update won't be so long away!

oh, and even though i have trouble keeping up with the blogs i've got, i started a new one. this one is because i read the news every day and want to put in my two cents, but don't want to bore everyone with my opinions if they aren't interested. so if you are interested, check it out:

legkontheworld.blogspot.com

it's november already?

i can't believe it's already november! my how time flies. i have a specific memory of neener (my stepmom) one time when i mentioned time flying when i was younger, in high school i think. she looked at me with this knowing face and said, "just wait 'til you're older, you have no idea." i don't know why i remember her saying that specifically, as i know a million people probably said that to me at some point. maybe it was the look on her face... who knows. but every year of my life seems to pass faster and faster and whenever i think about that, i always think, "neener was right!" :)

i can't wait to share all of the wedding photos with you all, but there are SEVEN HUNDRED AND THIRTY FIVE of them, so that's not going to be easy unless we're in the same house. so instead, i'll throw a few of them up here today for you! they are AMAZING. we love our photographer.

me reading the beautiful card bryan wrote me with the earrings he had delivered before the wedding. first time i cried that day. :)

bryan and his guys went to brown's island to have some pictures taken before the wedding. i love this one of my fabulous husband.

bryan and his very handsome groomsmen.

me and my very beautiful bridal party!

getting ready to go down the aisle. i love this shot of shane and grandma! i think it shows their relationship PERFECTLY! love it.

the kiss!

mr. and mrs. bryan klinger!

we're married! after the ceremony we went down by the dominion building to get some portrait shots of us.

and then back to brown's island for some family shots...

me getting bustled before we left brown's island to go to the reception. this was quite an undertaking for my girls! :)

our GRAND entrance! god, i was terrified he was going to drop me!

our first dance.

the father daughter dance. i love this picture of my dad. love it.

my little sister got real friendly with my friend jason, one of the volunteers at the arthritis foundation. i think she likes him, what do you think? :)

partying it up!

one of several groomsmen + whoever shots of the night. love justin's face (the groomsman with his jacket off)!

me with frane and britton, two of my best friends from college! wahoowa!

to smush or not to smush? (nice smushing ensued.)

love this picture of us right after the garter toss, where bryan first pulled panties out of HIS SLEEVE, not from under my dress, people! he is such a nut. we've seen this done before but i wasn't expecting it. i shoulda known better. :)

things started to get a little crazy...

queen of the dance floor. :)

bye bye everybody!!!